Taking a little break from working on the dash, I installed the door sill carpeting. Pretty straight forward. Plenty of trimming involved since I have the 1/2″ dynaliner and dynamat on the floor. Once the carpet was in place I installed the door sill aluminum pieces. I had my powdercoat guy give these a ‘brushed aluminum’ look with a nice clearcoat. They look pretty sharp. I didn’t want to ruin the look by riveting them into place like the manual would have you do, so I stuck them on with heavy duty double-sided adhesive tape.

Interior is starting to look like an interior more and more each day. Installed the floor carpeting today, and then prepped the seat belt retractors (have to remove the stop clip in each one) and receptacles. Receptacles were installed, but I am waiting on my harness bar to arrive before I tear down everything and install it, and the seat belts.

Did a mockup with the center console to see how it fits. I’ll have to cut out some of the Dynaliner where the console hugs the tunnel frame like I did with the engine cover previously. Right now the console fits fine, but its edges are pushed out enough to make it impossible to fit in the passenger dash all the way in.

Tonight was productive. I started out by installing the front footbox aluminum panel into place. Afterwards I moved on to tackling the thing I probably have been dreading more than anything this entire build – the driver’s side suede installation. I wanted to do the suede now so I could then in-turn install the footbox carpeting, which would then allow me to install the clutch pedal (otherwise it would just get in the way of the carpet install).

The suede is just one big piece and it is a pain to work with. My main advice is to just be patient with the process. I had to place, lineup, mark, remove, and cut frequently before I was satisfied with how the suede fit. Once I had it taped in place and cut to allow the fabric to be pushed flat without bubbling or wrinkling I got to work. I started gluing in the footbox, working from the floor up, and then outwards down the tunnel. The driver’s side is a pain due to the concave aluminum panels, so I glued the concave portion first then smoothed outwards towards the top and bottom, avoiding any wrinkling and extending my cut lines as necessary. Once everything was glued I trimmed the excess at the top and glued it to the frame.

With the suede in place I them moved on to the footbox carpeting. This was a pain due to the pedals being in the way, and having to fit, mark, and cut constantly, but patience prevailed. After the carpeting was done I reinstalled the clutch pedal. As you can see, the modified pedal allows for more foot space and freedom between the pedals.

After doing all this I realized I forgot to open up the duct outlet for the heater/ac. I slit the fabric above the vent and trimmed it a bit, then rolled it back down the edges of the Dynaliner to the mesh so it looks nice and clean.

Tonight I installed the oil fill neck and cap since the engine’s valve cover did not have one. I then moved the engine harness back to a higher position on the engine so that it does not come close to the headers. As a result, I have to lengthen the starter wires. The only remaining wire to lengthen now is the thick 6 gauge wire.

Afterwards I connected the VSS’s two wires. The only major thing remaining in the back of the car to wire up is the oil pump.

Before I reinstall the clutch pedal I want to get the carpeting out of the way, so I installed the driver-side lower-outer footbox piece. I will do the suede before doing the rest of the carpeting.

Tonight I installed the 45-degree fittings into the water pump outlets and re-installed the pump. The hoses will now be able to run freely without being kinked by the frame.

Josh finished the clutch pedal already so I primed and painted it – just need some good grip tape and it will look good as new. This mod will free up a bit of foot space in the footbox.

The axles are assembled and ready to go.

I decided to install the remaining footbox carpeting on the passenger side. I wasn’t looking forward to doing these pieces, but I found the Super 77 spray adhesive stays very tacky for a very long time, so you have plenty of time to work with the carpeting – just be patient and keep your fingers clean. I find that spraying small areas of the carpet at a time works best so that you don’t have to try to fit in the entire piece of carpeting in at once.

I decided to start on some carpeting, just to see how well this 3M Super 77 adhesive works. I started out by laying out all the pieces (8 total, 4 each side) and figuring what goes where. The carpeting will be a little trickier since I have both Dynamat and Dynaliner down, and some trimming is going to be necessary. I think I figured out how everything will go together, but for now I only installed the upper outer footbox pieces. The Super 77 has massive overspray and is pretty toxic, but it works great. I will probably do the lower footbox pieces next, then when the suede is installed I can do the floor and footbox pieces.